Page:The Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets, Volume 3.djvu/106

102 into blank verse will find few readers, while another can be had in rhyme. The piece addressed to Lambarde is no disagreeable specimen of epistolary poetry; and his ode to lord Gower was pronounced by Pope the next ode in the English language to Dryden’s Cecilia. Fenton may be justly styled an excellent versifier and a good poet.

WHATEVER I have said of Fenton is confirmed by Pope in a letter, by which he communicated to Broome an account of his death.

By Bag.
 * DR SIR.

Intended to write to you on this melancholy subject, the death of Mr. Fenton, before yrs came; but stay’d to have informed myself